Author: Breda Fay

I’ve said it frequently: nobody does pomp like the British and this is certainly epitomised with their commemorations. Their annual Festival of Remembrance of WW1 on the 11 November is always particularly poignant. Having visited the Normandy WW2 cemeteries this year, Poppy Day was even more touching.

I watched the service in the Royal Albert Hall.

There were the usual quotes of some famous war poets:

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: 
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
(from For the Fallen by Laurence Binyon)

Perhaps someday I shall not shrink in pain
To see the passing of the dying year,
And listen to the Christmas songs again
Although You cannot hear.

But, though kind Time may many joys renew,
There is one greatest joy I shall not know
Again, because my heart for loss of You
Was broken, long ago.
(from Perhaps 1916 By Vera Brittain, a nurse in WW1)

When you go home 
Tell them of us and say
For your tomorrow
We gave our today

(composed at the end of WW1 by wartime codebreaker, John Maxwell Edmonds, often called the Kohima epitaph)

The idealistic slogan "The war to end all wars" from the H.G. Wells’ 1914 book  The War That Will End War is usually used to describe WW1 little realising that the aftermath of that war contributed almost directly to WW2.

For many years we didnt acknowledge Poppy Day or its significance in many Irish lives. Happily, we’ve rectified that. The Irish Times today related the similarities of these past horrors with the catastrophe of current conflicts in the two articles on page 22 which emphasise the need for us all to take the side of PEACE.

Even in darkest places, there are those who keep a light shining

Thinking Anew: The horrors of the Hamas assault on Israel, and now of the bombing of Gaza, should not blind us to hope

Gordon Linney 11.11.23

Utopia is an idea worth clinging to. Otherwise, why get up in the morning?

Patsy McGarry 11.11.23

I watched the film Invictus (again) recently, probably as the Rugby World Cup 2023 was in its initial stages. The film told the story of Nelson Mandela’s first term as President of South Africa who enlisted the national rugby team as a symbol of unity in an Aparthid-torn land on their quest to win the 1995 Rugby World Cup.

I also watched One Team One Country, a very moving documentary on the same 1995 final.

Fast forward to Saturday, 28th October South Africa again emerged victorious, sweeping up many records as well as the Web Ellis Cup:
the first rugby nation to win four men’s Rugby World Cups
the second (after opponents New Zealand) to claim back-to-back title,
and undefeated by New Zealand in any Rugby World Cup final – twice they have defeated New Zealand in the final, in 1995 as Nelson Mandela’s dream and now again in 2023.

When I listened to the speech of their captain, Siya Kolisi, at the end of the match, it seemed as if Rugby is still as important and symbolic as it was in 1995. He made an incredible speech:

“Look what 1995 (and South Africa’s very first World Cup win) did for sport in our country. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for that, and the people that came before me. The people that made it possible for people of my colour to play.”

“People who are not from South Africa don’t understand what it means for our country. It is not just about the game. Our country goes through such a lot. We are just grateful that we can be here. I want to tell the people of South Africa ‘thank you so much’. This team just shows what you can do. As soon as we work together, all is possible, no matter in what sphere – in the field, in offices, it shows what we can do. I am grateful for this team, I am so proud of it.”

“There is so much that is wrong in our country,we are the last line of defence… there is so much division in our country but this team shows what people of different colours and backgrounds can do when they work together”.

These sentiments were echoed by his team-mate Faf de Klerk: “Hopefully this shows what unity and team-work can do… if we can come together like this, it can be a better country, and be a better world.”

I know very little about the game of Rugby – but if it means that much to a country – surely they are worthy winners. As a YouTuber commented: This Springbok team was special, not in talent, not in skill….special as they will be everlasting in our memories.

This was Bram Stoker weekend and there were activities all around Dublin.  The events I attended , while not directly connected with Bram or his character Dracula, celebrated blood and gore worthy of any horror story.  Both took place in the National Museum.

Hands-on History: Malady, Mourning and Mystery

I didn’t realise that there were “hands-on” collections in the National Museum. They are taken out for particular events and occasions.

For Hallowe’en weekend the Museum educators presented a range of objects from the Museum’s handling collection that reflect a history of life, disease and death.

Stories about how bone marrow was extracted, the use of mercury to cure STD’s, mourning broaches which contained hair of the deceased, vials and measures of potions and powders, bandages, first aid kits, and booklets about health and safety.

I was particularly fascinated by the quotes from Bram Stoker’s Dracula:

I know what sorrows you have had, though I cannot measure the depth of them.

I fear no weapon wrought alone by man’s hand would have any effect on him.

There is a poison in my blood, in my soul, which may destroy me.

Now, little miss, here is your medicine. Drink it off, like a good child.

A world full of miseries and woes and troubles: Life, Disease and Death in Collins Barracks

The second event was billed as a tour with a Museum guide to “discover the chills, ills, and kills in Collins Barracks’ 300-year long history”. Our guide told a detailed and very graphic story of the trials and tribulations of life as a soldier living in the Barracks from the 1700s until the late 1900s, with a focus on (ill) health, as well as the transition from one of Europe’s oldest occupied Barracks into one of Ireland’s National Museums.

It certainly lived up to expectations. The horrors of Dracula are nothing compared to the grim stories of the residents of this building over the years.

I hadn’t realised that our overpopulated country of the late 1700’s provided the Commonwealth with a steady valuable resource – man power. Over half the British army was Irish and they carved out the Empire, playing a significant role in the Napoleonic war, Crimean War, Zulu War, Boer War and WW1.

The Royal Barracks, as it was called, was one of the oldest and largest inhabited barracks in Europe, housing up to 1500 men and two troops of horses. Life was hard for the ordinary soldier, with harsh discipline and cruel punishment for infringements. The Provost Jail was quite literally two black holes dug under the Provost House for about five prisoners each but frequently accommodating forty to fifty.

Living accommodations was dangerously inadequate and the levels of disease very high. A limited number of families were housed in the most unsanitary conditions of the barracks. Cholera and Typhoid were rampant.
When their husbands were away fighting, the women also faced frequent attacks from soldiers on the base. Life for wives and children in the slums outside the barracks was even worse with their husbands absent for years, many of the women were forced into prostitution. The Lock Hospitals which were established close to many military barracks caused huge social problems as women could be incarcerated there for many months for merely living beside the barracks.

Hundreds of prisoners were housed in the barrack prison after each of the many Irish rebellions. Our guide described the severe methods of interrogation and torture practiced, very often for the entertainment of the troops rather than for information gathering. Flogging with “the cat” was common. Edward Heppenstall, “the walking Gallows” gave many performances of his skills in the barracks square. Pitch capping was also a frequent source of amusement.

STEPHEN STOKES TAPESTRY

We were all delighted to escape the stories of misery and disease, when our guide took us inside to see the Stokes Tapestry. British army soldier Stephen Stokes made this amazing textile while he was stationed in Ireland.

More than 30 panels tell the story of his career, first in the cavalry (the Royal Dragoons) and then in the Dublin Metropolitan Police. Stokes spent more than 15 years working on the tapestry and showed it to Queen Victoria when she visited in 1849.

He omitted telling her of his Irish sympathies, although they were cleverly hidden in the tapestry.

The Royal Coat of Arms is depicted with the shamrock intertwined with roses and thistles all coming from the same stem. I doubt Queen Victoria would have supported its display at the Great Exhibition in London in 1851

I recently watched the film, All Quiet on the Western Front, the story of the horrors of WW1 from the perspective of German boys/men.

Laurence Binyon’s poem For the Fallen published in the London Times in 1914 expresses the same sentiment of loss and horror from a British point of view.

For the Fallen by Laurence Binyon

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England’s foam.

But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;

As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.

H.G. Wells, the British author, coined the expression: “The war that will end war” to describe World War One.

My visit to the WW2 cemeteries of Normandy with their thousands of crosses clearly indicate the fallacy of Well’s statement.

In these recent days, we see the atrocities being perpetuated in the Middle East, the media opinions on who is right and wrong, who started it. Apportioning blame, justifying violence, seems to be the order of the day.  But I wonder who speaks for peace? Where is the voice of the moderate?

Coincidentally, I’ve just finished reading Colm McCann’s book, Apeirogon, based on the friendship between a Palestinian, Bassam Aramin, and an Israeli, Rami Elhanan: “An Israeli, against the occupation. A Palestinian, studying the Holocaust.” The men are united in their grief – they lost their daughters: Smadar, turned into “a scattered human jigsaw” at the age of 13 by a suicide bomber, and Abir, assassinated aged 10 by a trigger-happy member of the Israeli army. Both men join the Parents Circle, a group of bereaved parents who unite in their sorrow to press for a peaceful resolution to the conflict: “This became their jobs: to tell the story of what had happened to their girls.”

Apeirogon, a mathematical term for an object of an “observably infinite number of sides” is a most apt title for a book that addresses the entrenched positions in the Middle East with a stance that is on both sides and neither.